Can corals consume nitrate and phosphate at night?

[Miami Reef]

Or can they only absorb it during photosynthesis?

 

[blaxsun]

Good question. There's certainly less nitrates and phosphates when the lights go down...

 

[The_Paradox]

https://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/68/m068p065.pdf
For my two cents I know based on logging something in my tank pulls n/p all hours even in the tanks that are not on reverse light schedules

 

[Lavey29]

Good question. There's certainly less nitrates and phosphates when the lights go down...

Why is that? I always fluctuate my testing times and I see no variations other then maybe my own inconsistency.

 

[blaxsun]

Why is that?

Sleepy fish (no feeding, pooping), all the scavengers come out to perform cleanup duty, etc. I'm not suggesting it's night and day - just that it's probably a bit less at night.

 

[The_Paradox]

Sleepy fish (no feeding, pooping), all the scavengers come out to perform cleanup duty, etc.

I don’t think it works that way.

 

[blaxsun]

I don’t think it works that way.

It may very well not.

 

[Lavey29]

Sleepy fish (no feeding, pooping), all the scavengers come out to perform cleanup duty, etc. I'm not suggesting it's night and day - just that it's probably a bit less at night.

Makes sense, thanks...so if no new nitrates or phosphates introduce overnight and corals, some are night feeders, then we should see a drop in the morning number

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

My expectation is that uptake of dissolved N and P can happen any time, but I've not seen a test of that idea.